One in 10 U.S. kids has ADHD

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ADHD can lead to struggles in school for many children. Due in part to a growing awareness of the condition, the number of kids diagnosed with ADHD rose to 11% in 2011, up from 9.5% in 2007, CDC estimates show.

The number of U.S. children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder continues to rise but may be leveling off a bit, a new survey shows.

More than 1 in 10 children has been diagnosed with it, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which surveyed more than 95,000 parents in 2011.

The latest survey found about 11 percent of children ages 4 through 17 had been diagnosed with ADHD. That translates to nearly 6 ½ million children. Half of children are diagnosed by age 6, the study found.

A 2007 survey put ADHD diagnoses at 9.5 percent of kids.

The CDC survey asked parents if a health care provider told them their child had ADHD. It’s not known how thorough the assessment was to reach that conclusion.

ADHD diagnoses were increasing at a rate of about 6 percent a year in the mid-2000s, but slowed to 4 percent a year from 2007 to 2011. That may reflect that doctors are closer to diagnosing most of the kids with the condition, said the CDC’s Susanna Visser, the study’s lead author.